MASTER THESIS
Kim Sara Böttcher S1841211
Supervisor:
Mark van Vuuren Second supervisor:
Menno de Jong
Word Count:
15409
06.08.2021
Working at home - working alone:
How e-leaders and teleworkers
experience their relationship in a virtual environment
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Working at home - working alone: How e- leaders and teleworkers experience their
relationship in a virtual environment
Abstract
Purpose:
While teleworking has many positive implications, it also raises concerns about professional isolation and its consequences. E-leaders need to be able to enact leadership in new ways to be able to combat their employees feeling of professional isolation and build on a meaningful Leader-Member Exchange.
The objective of this study is to identify the activities leaders engage in, how the role of leadership is changing and how employees experience the relationship with their leader.
Method:
The data for this study was collected by the means of semi-structured interviews among four clusters of co-workers and their direct leaders. All 16 interviews were coded and analyzed and were
subsequently checked for intercoder reliability. Through analysis, four relevant dimensions emerged:
support vs. demand, proximity vs. distance, trust vs. control, and leader initiative vs. own initiative.
Results:
Participants described support, proximity, and trust as important building stones of a meaningful relationship whereas being demanding distant, and controlling hampers the forming of a meaningful relationship. Simple acts of support can help employees feel less isolated while working remotely.
These experiences further seem to be shaped by the individual's personality type as well as team size.
Conclusion:
The way that teleworkers and e-leaders experience relationships at the workplace depend on many factors. Those with more meaningful relationships may continue to receive greater benefits which can further improve their relationship. However, building and maintain a meaningful relationship in an online context is not always easy and may call for the role of a leader to change towards a more people-oriented rather than task-oriented approach.
E-leadership, Professional Isolation, Teleworking, Leader-Member Exchange
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Table of Contents
Abstract ... 1
Introduction ... 4
Theoretical Framework ... 6
Leader-Member-Exchange Theory ... 6
Professional Isolation ... 7
E-leadership ... 8
Overview and Novelty ... 9
Method ... 10
Design ... 10
Data collection and instrument ... 10
General questions ... 11
Contact... 11
Leadership ... 12
Professional isolation ... 12
Participants ... 12
Analysis ... 14
Results ... 15
Dimensions ... 16
Support vs. demanding. ... 16
Trust vs. control. ... 17
Proximity vs. distance. ... 17
Leader initiative vs. employee initiative. ... 18
Dimensions per team ... 19
Team 1 ... 19
Team 2 ... 23
Team 3 ... 25
Team 4 ... 29
Discussion ... 31
Main Findings... 31
Theoretical implications ... 33
Practical implications ... 35
Limitations and future research ... 36
Conclusion ... 37
References ... 39
Appendix A: Questions for the interviews with employees ... 43
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Appendix B: Codebook ... 45 Appendix C: Overview of Dimensions ... 51
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Introduction
The rise of information and communication technologies (ICTs) has led to a transformation in modern work environments, enabling quick communication, constant accessibility, and flexibility in the workplace. This change has led many to work from remote locations, such as one’s home, employing ICTs to communicate and complete their task which is often referred to as teleworking (Baruch, 2001). Teleworking does not only have an impact on employees' practices and feelings but also affects the way that leaders have to lead and communicate. Previous studies exploring the work relationships of teleworkers focussed mostly on teams where only a few individuals worked remotely (Rockmann &
Pratt, 2015). The advancements in technology, however, have caused more people to work remotely, changing the dynamics at the workplace, including relationships. This increase in teleworking is further enhanced by the pandemic of the coronavirus, forcing companies and employees alike to shift to an online work environment.
The shift from working in the office to working from home happened rather rapidly. In many cases, employees finished their workday, leaving work expecting to return the next day. However, following the press conference of the Dutch government, announcing the closing of workplaces and schools alike, this never happened. Employees, as well as leaders, were left unprepared for the weeks to follow, many finding themselves in an unknown situation. For several, this development meant juggling their kids staying at home, household tasks as well as work. All from the same, confined space, often straining concentration and efficiency. A major change also surrounded the workplace contacts: where one could previously stay in touch with colleagues over lunch now only saw them for scheduled meetings, often influencing the relationships they had at work.
One of the most relevant relationships at the workplace is the relationship between the supervisor and the employee. In literature, it is argued that the relationships between teleworkers and their supervisors become increasingly personal compared to regular office employees (Collins, Hislop
& Cartwright, 2016). This is due to the fact that supervisors get a more direct insight into the
employees' personal life and private space. Additionally, Halford (2005) suggests that the relationship between supervisors and teleworkers is often growing to be more personal as a monitoring function.
This happens for two reasons: 1) the leader is reaching out to their employees working from home more often for task-related topics as well as checking in on the personal welling and 2) teleworkers often become more productive at home as a mechanism to show their leader that they are trustworthy and capable. On the other hand, literature suggests that teleworkers are often less in the focus of the supervisors, as they are not as present as their office-based colleagues (Collins et al., 2016; Hill, Ferris
& Märtinson, 2003; Rockmann & Pratt, 2015). The amount of trust the manager has could influence, for example, the tasks given and the amount of control exerted virtually, which is often related to the Leader-Member Exchange Theory and could significantly differ between individuals that see their
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leader daily and those that work from home. According to Collins et al. (2016), this relation between trust and perceived benefits is not sufficiently researched yet as well as the general relation between teleworkers and supervisors. Amongst others, seeing one another face-to-face in the office serves as an important factor in establishing trust between people (Coenen & Kok, 2014) as well as exchanging anecdotes and work-related information. However, it is not clear yet how much video-calling can be seen as a substitute for face-to-face contact, especially with regard to the forming and maintaining of relationships.
It becomes apparent that the forming of meaningful relationships, conversations, and
relationship management activities by leaders in an online environment is crucial to ensuring a healthy work atmosphere. Generally, leading in an online environment is referred to as e-leadership (Avolio &
Kahai, 2003). High-quality e-leadership is important to ensure employee well-being as well as work quality and satisfaction. One of the most prominent theories of the field to assess the quality of a relationship between leader and employee is the Leader-Member Exchange Theory (Graen & Uhl- Bien, 1995). While this theory was developed for an offline environment, some studies employ it in an online context (Jawadi, Daassi, Favier & Kalika, 2013), however, an adjusted model for virtual context is still needed and research into the dynamics of fully teleworking teams is scarce. While a high-quality relationship has many benefits, leaders need to ensure to build and maintain these, as low- quality relationships have several negative implications such as a high turnover rate. Generally, the quality of the relationship directly affects employee work attitudes as well as behaviors (Breevart, Bakker, Demerouti &Van den Heuvel, 2015). Working remotely, hereby introduces many new challenges and obstacles to overcome as well as adjusting known practices to a teleworking environment.
Teleworking can have a positive impact on employees' work satisfaction, especially in situations where the contact with the other office employees is perceived as negative (Collins et al., 2016) as well as generally facilitating a better work-life balance and increase satisfaction (Liao, 2017).
However, working remotely also comes with the thread of professional isolation, which negatively impacts the work satisfaction of employees (Bentley et al., 2016). Professional isolation is defined as a reduction in opportunities for promotion, receiving rewards, or personal development (Cooper &
Kurland, 2002). This professional isolation can be combat by having meaningful conversations with other employees or supervisors. However, if the perceived degree of professional isolation gets too high, this will negatively influence workplace relationships and is an important factor to consider when exploring relationships at the workplace.
As professional isolation of employees in an online environment is an important challenge of today's work environment, insight into the daily activities of leaders and employees with regard to social contacts and what kind of impact the conversations have on the employees need to be gathered.
These insights can be used to offer practical guidance to leaders on how to combat the professional isolation of their employees as well as build a meaningful relationship to prevent professional isolation
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in the first place. This research aims to explore the ways through which e-leaders and teleworkers enact their relationship to create a meaningful connection with one another and combat professional isolation in a virtual environment.
The research question this study aims to answer is:
How do e-leaders and teleworkers perceive their relationship in a virtual environment?
Theoretical Framework
In this chapter, an outline will be given of existing theories and concepts which are important when looking at relationships at the workplace in an online environment. One theory that can not be overlooked when talking about the relationship between leader and member, is the Leader-Member- Exchange Theory. The theory is using the quality of workplace relationships to assess benefits and disadvantages resulting from it, the latter possibly negatively affecting an employee's sense of belonging. Then, previous research has suggested that working from a remote location can harm employees feeling of connectedness to their workplace and colleagues, thus causing professional isolation. The final theoretical building block is the concept of e-leadership, which describes
leadership and relationship management activities in an online context and relating to both the LMX as well as professional isolation.
Leader-Member-Exchange Theory
The Leader-Member-Exchange (LMX) theory was developed by Graen and Cashman in 1975 (as mentioned in Peng, 2020) and is one of the more established theories in the field. Generally, LMX is used to assess the nature and quality of the relationship between leaders and employees (e.g.
Cortallazzo, Bruni & Zampieri, 2019; Jawadi et al., 2013). The theory states that leaders develop a unique exchange relationship with their leader at the workplace (Breevart et al., 2015).
LMX is often associated with other exchange theories. Yang et al. (2020) state that in the dyadic exchange, both the leader and the employee have expectations about the benefit or cost of a relationship. Further, relationships formed for economic purposes can be transformed into a social exchange relationship, if the connection between the leader and the employee is meaningful (Peng, 2020). Further, it is argued that a high-quality Leader-Member Exchange may help intrinsically motivate employees to become engaged at their workplace, thus being more committed (Breevart et al., 2015).
According to the LMX theory, leaders and employees form differentiated relationships
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through work-related exchanges (Jawadi et al., 2013). This means, that some connections formed will be stronger and more meaningful than others. The unique relationships formed are constantly changing based on how each party fulfills the expectations of the others and the expectations attached to their role (Volmer, Niessen, Spurk, Linz, & Abele, 2011). Mumtaz and Rowley (2019) describe that the leaders may deter from strictly formal conventions to empower and support those employees that they have a high-quality relationship with. Breevart et al. (2015) go even further and describe that those with a meaningful relationship with their leader more often receive the freedom to choose their own work tasks as well as decide how to execute them. Those that have a low qualitative relationship with their leader, may receive fewer benefits and therefore have a disadvantage at the workplace.
Multiple authors link high-quality LMX to the concept of trust (Jawahar, Stone & Kluemper, 2019). De Vries, Tummers, and Bekkers (2019) describe that social exchange, as well as reciprocity, are effective tools to develop trust between leader and follower, whereas low-quality relationships stay contractual. This is in line with Breevart et al. (2015) who mention that a bond is often built on trust as well as mutual obligations, further highlighting the reciprocity. Furthermore, it is believed that the effect of trust is especially strong when employees also feel empowered (Jawahar et al., 2019).
Additionally, high-quality LMX can improve the relationship between employee and leader so much, that the employees can take over higher roles, sometimes naturally growing through the
relationship (Hooper & Martin, 2008). Others argue that this high-quality relationship is maturing over time, suggesting that there may be different requirements for a relationship depending on tenure (Park, Sturman, Vanderpool & Chan, 2015).
Lastly, in their research De Vries et al. (2019) found LMX to be an effective tool in which the facilitated trust helps reduce professional isolation in teleworkers who do not have the option to interact with others face-to-face.
Professional Isolation
Professional isolation is an important concept when looking at teleworking. However, it is not limited to those employees. Professional isolation is defined as an employee's state of mind or belief, that one is out of touch with others in the workplace (Diekema, 1992). This phenomenon is more likely to occur with teleworkers, as they are less likely to experience meaningful conversations in the same frequency as traditional office workers would. Bentley et al. (2016) describe this as a person-
environment mismatch, where the missing support from the organization as well as the lack of social interaction is causing teleworkers to experience professional isolation.
Teleworkers can experience isolation in relation to the workplace in two ways: professionally and socially. Professionally, teleworkers fear reduced career possibilities, while socially, teleworkers lack informal interaction with others (De Vries et al., 2019; Kurland & Cooper, 2002). While social isolation may decrease depending on whether employees work at home or a remote office,
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professional isolation of teleworkers can increase regardless (Kurland & Cooper, 2002).
Professional isolation has many negative implications. Teleworkers that feel isolated are often less confident in their abilities and knowledge, which can have an impact on their job performance (Golden, Veiga & Dino, 2008). A feeling of professional isolation may also hinder employee development, as this process is fostered through informal day-to-day experiences and activities (Cooper & Kurland, 2002). It becomes increasingly harder for teleworkers to coordinate complex tasks, as they are missing relevant relationships for exchange which hampers their work performance and increases their feeling of isolation (Bentley et al., 2016). In addition to that, professional isolation is likely to increase turnover intention (Golden et al., 2008). This can be explained by teleworkers' desire to combat their isolation drastically, seeking comfort and change at a different organization.
E-leadership
The rapid growth of information and communication technologies (ICTs), and the from that resulting increase of employees working remotely, calls for a new style of leadership. Leaders have to learn to adjust to the virtual environment and become leaders online, thus introducing the concept of e- leadership (Avolio & Kahai, 2003). At its core, leadership, as well as e-leadership, is about the development of work relationships. (Avolio & Kahai, 2003). E-leaders are expected to be familiar with new ICTs and know how to operate them (Groysberg, 2014). Jawadi et al. (2013) further expand this and note that e-leaders need to make use of multiple communication channels that vary in
richness. Avolio and Kahai (2003), the pioneers in this field, suggest that due to virtuality the entire essence of how employees perceive leaders to be present may be changing.
Roman et al. (2018) composed a complete definition of e-leadership, providing more insight into what e-leadership inherits. According to them:
E-leadership is a set of technology-mediated social influencing processes intended to change attitudes, feelings, thinking, behavior, and performance, which are based on ability to communicate clearly and appropriately, provide adequate social interaction, inspire and manage change, build and hold teams accountable, demonstrate technological know-how related to ICTs, and develop a sense of trust in virtual environments. (Roman et al., 2018, p.
10)
As e-leaders have an important relationship with their employees, they must keep up with their employee's work. Good e-leadership has a direct positive impact on employee performance (Wolor et al., 2020). E-leaders need to ensure to create a digital environment for their employees that enables them to work effectively, including concepts such as high productivity and low turnover (Roman et al., 2018). This includes motivating and supporting their employees, in order to ensure that their
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employees keep improving (Cortellazzo et al., 2019). Lastly, building good relationships with their employees is crucial to ensure knowledge exchange and meaningful conversations.
This can be achieved by relationship management, which remains challenging for e-leaders, as they do not have the same opportunities as they would have face-to-face (Jawadi et al., 2013). In their research, Van Wart et al. (2017) propose that e-leaders competencies are a crucial aspect in establishing a meaningful relationship with their employees. Some of the e-competencies mentioned by Van Wart et al. (2017) are e-communication skills, e-social skills, e-team building skills, and e- trustworthiness help establishing a positive connection with the leader as well as fostering
collaboration, higher productivity as well as improved employee satisfaction.
Yet, e-leadership, especially in its developing stages, may not only be a task performed by an individual leader but rather a system operating on an organizational level (Torre & Sarti, 2020). All members of an organization constantly shape what leadership incorporates. Torre and Sarti (2020) describe that an ideal e-leader should be able to combine resources and behaviors and facilitate their employees to become collaborators rather than subordinates.
Overview and Novelty
The research’s theoretical foundation is built on three pillars: 1) Leader-Member Exchange 2) Professional isolation and 3) E-leadership. LMX is an established theory used to assess the quality of relationships built between leader and employee and is built on social exchange theories. This theory differentiates between high-quality relationships, which offer several benefits to the employee, and low-quality relationships in which the nature of the relationship stays purely contractual. Professional isolation occurs frequently in teleworkers who feel like they are out of touch with their colleagues and leader and as a result, can negatively influence a person's confidence and abilities. This occurs because employees experience less meaningful conversations as well as less perceived support. Lastly, e- leadership is concerned with the act of leading as well as developing relationships in a virtual
environment, mediated by ICTs, to influence attitudes, behaviors, and performance as well as facilitate trust. Good e-leadership should facilitate a high-quality relationship which in turn can combat negative feelings at or about the workplace, depending on the level of e-skills the leader possesses.
This study is unique in so far, that most studies relating to teleworkers' relationships, needs, and experiences focus on companies in which only few employees work remotely while this study's main focus is on teams where most if not all individuals work remotely. That way, this research fills the gap of how dynamics work in this context. An important factor to keep in mind is that opposed to virtual teams that are globally dispersed, the participants in this study did not choose to work remotely but rather were forced to due to COVID-19 which adds another unique dynamic to the research.
Further, the application of the LMX in online environments has thus far been underrepresented in
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research. Additionally, this research is going to interview both leaders and their respective employees whereas many studies in the field so far focus their research on only one of them.
Method
Design
In this study, a qualitative study design was employed. In order to collect data, semi-structured interviews were conducted to get an insight into the participants' experiences and feelings concerning the topic. The study is of explorative nature. The collected data is rather sensitive as it is dealing with leadership quality as well as isolation and therefore had to be treated carefully. For participants to still be willing to disclose such sensitive information, a trustful environment needed to be created which can be achieved in interviews through rapport (DiCicco-Bloom & Crabtree, 2006; Heath, Williamson, William & Harcourt, 2018). All interviews were conducted in an online environment, which means that all participants could take part from their own homes which potentially help the participant to speak more freely (Lo Iacono et al., 2016). The participants were able to choose which video-calling software they preferred to use for the interviews. In the end, a wide variety of video software was used among which MS Teams, Google Meet, and Zoom.
Before the start of the data collection, a research plan of the study at hand was submitted to the Ethical Committee of the University of Twente. This was done to ensure that all steps taken during the research conformed to ethical norms and regulations and that no participants would be harmed in any way during the process. The approval of the Ethical Committee was granted without further
comments.
All interviews were recorded with the permission of the participants, using OBS Studio. The recording was limited to audio to ensure the participants could stay as anonymous as possible. At the start of the study, the participants were informed about their rights to withdraw from the study at any point as well as how their personal data would be treated. Subsequently, the participants were asked whether they agreed with the aforementioned information as well as their consent for the recording before continuing with the actual interview. At the end of the interview, all participants were given the opportunity to express questions or concerns with regard to the interview.
Data Collection and Instrument
The data collection was done by the means of semi-structured interviews which were conducted over the span of five weeks. Initially, the interviews were supposed to last one hour, however, due to time restrictions of the participants this time was lowered to 30-45 minutes per participant. The set of
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questions for leaders as opposed to the questions for the employees differed slightly.
The questions for the employees were split into separate parts: general questions regarding the workplace, leadership, contact moments, and professional isolation. The questions for the (team)leader were including the same categories, however, relating more to the steps they regard as necessary to ensure a good work atmosphere as well as employee well-being. The full interview guide used can be found in Appendix A.
All participants were informed at the beginning of the interview, that they could respond to the questions in Dutch if they were more comfortable with that. This step was taken to ensure participants were as comfortable as possible and that there was not going to be a language barrier preventing them from expressing their emotions properly. Nevertheless, all participants except one expressed that they were comfortable answering the questions in English and only used Dutch words if they could not come up with the English equivalent. However, before the interview process started, the interviewer made sure to translate the list of questions into Dutch, in case participants would not understand a question.
In order to find participants for this research, the network of the researcher was contacted via LinkedIn and email. There were only few inclusion criteria formulated. The inclusion criteria were that participants had to be above 18 years and have been working remotely at their respective company and preferably already experienced working from the office beforehand. Further, it was important that one participant of each team was their respective leader. The study focused on companies and teams within the Netherlands, however, nationality itself was not an exclusion criterion.
General questions
The general questions were meant to get the interviewee comfortable in the interview, with easy questions so they could talk starting about their work on their own terms. Those, where the teleworking situation was not entirely clear beforehand, were asked to elaborate on it. Then, participants were asked to illustrate how a typical workday in the home office looked like. This allowed them to freely talk about aspects of their work that they thought were important. If relevant, follow-up questions were asked.
Contact
Then, some more probing questions about the contact with their team and leader were asked, if possible based on the previous description of their workday, as that should include contact moments with their respective colleagues and/or leaders. This included the focus of the nature of contact, frequency of contact, and overall experience of contact and how this has changed as opposed to the
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normal office situation. The questions for the leader were concerning how they experienced the dynamic in their team now and how available/active they still were in the day-to-day dynamics.
Leadership
The questions with regard to leadership were centered around the participants' perception of what good leadership means, which qualities a good leader has, and how this compares to their situation.
Additionally, they were asked if they would do anything differently as well as which activities they perceived as helpful for building and maintain a relationship. Further, they were asked whether it was easy to get in touch with their leader. The questions for their leader revolved around how they experienced leading in an online environment, what the biggest challenges and changes were, and what they think new starting employees would need to build a relationship with their leader as well as the team.
Professional isolation
To ease the participants into this sensitive topic, they were asked what the biggest challenge of working from home was for them. Based on that follow-up questions were asked. They were asked whether they felt like they could contact their leader with issues, whether personal or professional, at all times and what they thought their leader could do to help them with their problems. The questions for the leader were more related to whether they thought they had a good overview of what was going on within their team as well as with their employees personally. Additionally, they were asked
whether they think their employees would be comfortable contacting them with their issues and if they would do something about it.
Participants
Table 1.
Team 1 Team 2 Team 3 Team 4
Leader 1 Leader 2 Leader 3 Leader 4
Teleworker 1.1 Teleworker 2.1 Teleworker 3.1 Teleworker 4.1 Teleworker 1.2 Teleworker 2.2 Teleworker 3.2 Teleworker 4.2 Teleworker 1.3 Teleworker 2.3 Teleworker 3.3
Teleworker 2.4 Overview of the teams
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To gain insight into the topic, a sample of 16 participants was collected. These participants were divided into four clusters based on which team they belonged to, each consisting of a team leader and two to five of their employees each. An overview of the teams can be found in Table 1. As this was only a sample of the actual team, the respective teams were all bigger than the final sample. Of the four teams, three were working completely from home, with exceptional one-on-one meetings if necessary. Team 3 had a schedule that allowed them to work from home part-time and still see their colleagues in the office. However, the team works on divided locations, meaning that they are still
relying on telecommunication tools to keep in touch with the other part of the team.
Of the 16 participants, 12 were female and four were male. All team leaders of this sample were female. The teams varied in size with team one having a total of six members, team two having roughly 12 members, team three having more than 30 members, and team four having more than 20 members. An overview can be found in Table 2. All teams are located in the Netherlands. Three of the teams hereby were working in Marketing/Communications and one team in Public Relations. Most of the participants already had a lot of work experience and had been working for the respective company for more than a year at the time of the interview. Only three of the participants had started at their company less than a year prior to the interview, of which two were from Team 2. However, one of the participants of Team 2 already had a significant amount of experience in the same field beforehand. The age differed largely per team, however, Team 1 generally had the youngest team altogether. The other teams, while also differing within the teams themselves, were rather similar in age.
Table 2.
In terms of contact, all teams employed a variety of means to stay connected with text messages, calls, emails, and video calls all being mixed. Nevertheless, teams still differed in the exact means they preferred. The most popular software for most communication hereby was MS Teams, with only one team primarily relying on Google Meet. Furthermore, teams reported different amounts of contact they
Overview of participant characteristics
Characteristics Team 1 Team 2 Team 3 Team 4 Total Gender
Male 1 1 1 1 4
Female 3 4 3 2 12
Team size
Sample 4 5 4 3 16
General ~6 ~12 ~30 ~20 ~70
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had with their team and leader, ranging from daily meetings to longer meetings once every two weeks.
The details per team can be found in Table 3.
Table 3.
Analysis
In order to analyze the collected data, all interviews were recorded and transcribed. The transcription was done using the online software “Amberscript”. All transcripts were manually checked and corrected by the researcher afterward, to ensure that all information was correct.
Subsequently, all interview transcriptions were coded using ATLAS.ti. To make sense of the data, a grounded theory approach was used. During the first round of open coding, constant
comparison between the data was used to gain a deeper understanding of data as well as roughly categorizing it (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). The first round of open coding resulted in multiple codes which could be used to describe the data, in which relevant themes and topics emerged. These codes were grouped together to the first version of the codebook, which consisted of five categories and 21 codes. Another round of coding showed that not all relevant data was adequately described by the current codes, which made another round of open coding followed by a round of axial coding necessary. New codes were added to the codebook while others were grouped together to better explain the data. This ultimately resulted in a codebook consisting of six categories and 32 codes.
Then, the interviews were coded according to the pre-defined codebook.
To ensure the validity of the study and results, a second coder was individually coding two interviews with a leader and three interviews with employees, which were then checked for intercoder reliability. This step was done to ensure that the codes are formulated clearly and are relevant
(McHugh, 2012). The transcriptions were chosen based on whether there were no technical issues with the recording and whether the documents represented as many different teams as possible. The second coder received the general purpose of the study and was briefly informed about the procedure of the coding. Subsequently, the second coder received the codebook and was given the opportunity to ask
Overview of main contact within teams
Contact Team 1 Team 2 Team 3 Team 4
Means Video calls,
calls, texts, Emails
Video calls, calls, Emails
Video calls, calls
Video Calls, Emails
Platform MS Teams Google Meet MS
Teams, Zoom
MS Teams
Frequency Daily Weekly Weekly Bi-weekly
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questions and provide feedback with regard to clarity and relevancy of the codes. Generally, no major issues arose but the description of some codes had to be adjusted for clarity or to differentiate between multiple codes better. The codebook which emerged from this analysis can be found in Appendix B.
After these clarifications, the second coder began coding. As soon as both coders were done coding the agreed-upon documents, the codes were checked for intercoder reliability by measuring the Cohens kappa. All scores were evaluated per category. A Cohens Cappa is deemed as an acceptable value if the score is above at least 0.61 and a strong value above 0.80 (McHugh, 2012). Only one of the scores falls short of being a strong value, yet it is still considered an acceptable value. Therefore all scores were deemed sufficient which then concluded the process for intercoder reliability. An
overview of the intercoder reliability scores can be found in Table 4.
Table 4.
Results
In order to present the results, the following paragraph will be divided into two parts: the dimensions and the dimensions per team. In the first part, an overview will be given over the dimensions which emerged through analysis and can be used to explain the relationship between leader and employee. A brief overview of the dimensions can be found in Table 5. Then, in the second part, the position of each team within these dimensions will be described in-depth. A more detailed overview of all the dimensions can be found in Appendix C.
# Category Cohen's Kappa
1 Teleworking 0.84
2 Perception of relationship 0.95
3 Perception of professional isolation 0.89
4 Contact 0.78
5 Plans for improvement 1.00
6 E-leadership 0.92
Results of intercoder reliability
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Dimensions
Table 5.
Support vs. demanding.
This dimension describes the support provided in the relationship between employee and leader.
Generally, support was perceived to be present when the participants felt like their leader was actively trying to find solutions for their problems, there was attention for personal wellbeing and a general feeling of the leader being present as well as being approachable. In addition to that, being open to feedback and considering criticism was seen as important. An example for this was given by Teleworker 3.1:
That is one of my agenda points for that meeting because she is also encouraging us to bring up this kind of ideas, especially if you’re working in such a big team. You can not only be on her shoulders.
The relationship was perceived as demanding if decisions were made without consulting or taking the feelings and opinions of the participants involved into consideration. Also creating a mismatch between the offered solution and the needs of the participants was perceived negatively and added to the feeling of being commanded rather than asked. Additionally, if participants did not feel like they could openly voice their opinion or that this would not be valued, this would be seen as demanding.
Brief description of dimensions
Side 1 Side 2
Support Support provided by leader e.g. in form of attention, open to fedback and finding solutions
Making decisions wihtout consulting or taking into consideration employees and not being open to criticism
Demanding
Trust The absence of control
as well as having the freedom to make own decision
Lack of freedom over execution of tasks and time management as well as (nonverbal)
obligations
Control
Proximity The closeness of participants
relationship to others
The perception of being disconnected from others
Distance
Leader Initiative Initiative taken by the leader to organize activities as well as the perception of their general involvement
Initiative taken by employees to organize activities as well as their general involvement
Employee Initiative 1. Description 2.
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Teleworker 2.4 gave an example of this: “er wordt dan niet aan mij gevraagd van nou, vind je dat wel een prettig idee” [No one is asking me whether I find this a good idea].
Trust vs. control.
The dimension of trust is often mentioned by participants in relation to the absence of control.
Teleworker 1.2 explained: “I feel like that is giving me a feeling of trust as well. If my boss were to constantly check on me how I was doing then I would have the suspicion that she thinks she as to intervene”. Participants felt trusted when they were free to make their own decisions regarding their projects as well as getting the freedom to execute tasks in creative ways. Additionally, being in charge of their own task- and time management was a prominent factor in feeling trusted by their leader.
On the contrary, control was perceived as the lack of freedom over the execution of tasks and time management as well as the inability to make choices with the regard to working from. In addition to that, employees reported that there are certain (non-verbal) obligations and expectations present at the workplace, which were non-negotiable and not always in line with the employee’s expectations and needs. Teleworker 4.1 described this: “You’re telling me you don’t have to go. Your choice, but what I feel is a different thing. So, it’s nonverbal kind of pressure and that is something that’s not
recognized”. If the leader then was unwilling to compromise between their wants and their employees’
wants this was perceived as controlling.
Proximity vs. distance.
When talking about proximity, participants described the closeness of their relationship with others, often including its informal and personal nature. To describe the relationship with others, participants often described the activities that help them to stay connected to others and maintain their
relationships, such as coffee moments and calls. Leader 3 offered an example of that:
You see and hear things from people that you didn’t know who has a dog, who’s sitting in the attic behind the washer over the next to the washing machine, who has like a nice sort of office at home, children. You see them walk by cats or, you know, go over the laptop or whatever.
Further, participants described the activities which they perceived as helpful for building and maintaining relationships at the workplace. Additionally, it helped participants to feel connected to others if it was easy to reach out to them.
This dimension described the participants’ feelings of being disconnected from their
colleagues and leader. Frequently, this was described as the perception, that some people were keeping their distance in the online environment and therefore, disappearing nearly fully. This includes not being able to keep up with recent developments and work-related progress as well as increasingly
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formal connections to others that previously had been of an informal nature. While not discussed directly, this further includes the feeling of being isolated from others. This dimension is illustrated by the statement of Teleworker 3.2:
I think now that we are working online, it’s easier for some people to kind of disappear almost and to keep an eye on everyone and to have an idea of what’s going on, which is I think it’s different.
Leader initiative vs. employee initiative.
This dimension describes the ownership, or lack thereof, taken by the leader to organize activities and other relationship-building activities for their team, as well as their general involvement in the team.
An example of this was given by Leader 2:
We had it once and we said we do it every week, but we didn’t repeat it, but to me, that’s my fault because then I didn’t plan it again. And you see, I have to plan it, then it happens, the team members don’t take it over.
The employees described the role they played in the organization and the realization of relationship- building activities with their team and leader, as well as their general involvement. Additionally, this dimension describes the initiative taken and willingness to organize activities, mostly of informal nature, to stay connected to their colleagues and leader, as well as their expectations of what should be organized. Teleworker 3.2 described that they, as a team, were responsible to organise certain events:
“Well, the structure that we all already had in place was that the team was in charge of team-building exercises”.
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Dimensions per Team
Graph 1.
Team 1
Support vs demanding
Generally, the team felt very supported by their leader as well as by their fellow colleagues. The participants described that, while they did not always feel it was necessary to approach their leader for personal problems, their leader would be there for them if they did approach them as Teleworker 1.2 described: “It was mostly a matter of discipline, I don’t know how my boss would have been able to discipline me from somewhere else in such a way”. Teleworker 1.3 added to that: “And I haven't really had to discuss, like, emotional stuff or emotional well-being necessarily with her. And but I think she would have I would just assume that she would have the openness also from this
compassionate”.
Participants generally talked very positively about the relationship with their leader. One participant mentioned that they thought having some scheduled one-on-one time a week really “does help still to build that relationship just towards the boss” (Teleworker 1.1). Another participant described their leaders’ approach to help them through the transition and find ways for them to work through it:
she really understood that our creativity is. Like harmed or a bit less present or easy to get if we're not all together and share ideas and she really put us at ease, that it's normal. So first, she acknowledged that it's normal to have like a reduced creativity and to be maybe less
productive in terms of idea generation. So she acknowledged this. And she also set up, um, a
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group like a meeting every week where we would exchange ideas that we saw on the news or topics or trends that we found interesting. (Teleworker 1.3)
In addition to that, this team did experience some discrepancies after a few months of working from home. They approached their leader about it and had a conversation to improve the feelings they had towards each other, which shows that they thought their leader was someone they can approach with their problems: “a few weeks ago we did have a confrontation because we could just feel that the entire vibe was just really down and we did confront our leader and the entire team actually just laid it out open” (Teleworker 1.1).
For these reasons, it can be said that this team generally feels supported by their leader in the online environment, even though they sometimes thought it was harder to reach out to their leader due to busy schedules and were afraid that their leader would possibly not see their message among all their unopened communications: “if I know that it is more difficult to get in touch with her I will find a way around it” (Teleworker 1.2).
Trust vs. control
This was the only team where people directly and voluntarily brought up the topic of trust with Teleworker 1.1 stating: “yes, I think to a certain extent, that she does really trust us”. When talking about the relationship with their leader, trust emerged as a relevant relationship characteristic between the employees and the leader. Generally, if there was a feeling of trust it enabled a more positive relationship with the leader. One participant especially linked their perception of trust to their leader giving them the freedom to work and make decisions by themselves without closely supervising every step: “I feel like that is giving me a feeling of trust as well. If my boss were to constantly check on me how I was doing then I would have the suspicion that she thinks she as to intervene” (Teleworker 1.2).
So in a way, the lack of control was often seen as a sign of trust in this team. Another team member supported this by mentioning that they did feel that their leader was trusted them to a certain degree and further strengthened the link between freedom and trust:
I like the amount of responsibility that is on me now. It gives you the freedom of devising a plan, a freedom of actually arranging certain things and then you get the oversight that is more an advising role than someone who is completely incorporated in it. And that is nice because it boosts personal growth. (Teleworker 1.1)
However, in addition to that, the participant mentioned that it was still good to keep the leader
involved in their tasks as they felt that “I can also imagine that from her point of view, that maybe she just thinks we are doing nothing because it is so silent” (Teleworker 1.1).
21 Proximity vs distance
The responses here were very mixed and include varying topics from what kind of relationship they would want at the workplace to how close or distanced they felt like they were. In the first team, it became very apparent that not all people were very sure whether they wanted a close relationship with their fellow colleagues and leader, as participant two stated: “This is still my first job and I am having a bit of a tough time deciding on where the line is between friends and colleagues”. Another employee mentioned while they appreciate getting along with their colleagues at the workplace and having a laugh with them, they did not need to spend any time with them in their free time (Teleworker 1.3).
Teleworker 1.2 added: “Myself, I like to keep it very separated but I don’t know where I base that on.
It is just my feeling of being a professional”. However, they also mentioned that they are the informal moments with their colleagues nevertheless and that a lot of their communication was already informal (Teleworker 1.2). Teleworker 1.2 felt the most strongly about too close contact with their colleagues and mentioned that they already felt like they knew their colleagues well enough and did not need many extra moments with them:
I think ties together well with what I said before about where to draw the line between a colleague and a friend, kind of. I wouldn’t mind but I feel like I know my colleagues to a decent level already and in my lunch break I would like to do something else than working if I know that the relationship with my colleagues is solid. If I would start in a company I would have the feeling like I would have to catch up or something and then I would definitely invest time in building this relationship. (Teleworker 1.2)
Generally, they mentioned that it is more difficult to emotionally connect with their team.
Conversations online more easily become more formal and work-related, which makes it easier to overlook how people are doing on a personal level: “Chatting about how we're doing and also talking about personal development, during this covid time, I would have to admit, though, the work talk has hijacked most of our bilateral.” (Teleworker 1.3). Also, the leader of this team elaborated that due to their work of line, they usually grow a very tight bond in the office, which hasn’t happened the same way online. They further mentioned that the size of their team enables them to create a personal relationship with one another:
But I don't think that you could compare the social interactions of our team. I don't think you could compare it to the social interactions of a department that has one hundred and fifty people, a staff sitting in because within that you always have also the smaller groups that have interactions in those settings. (Leader 1)
Especially the team leader here finds it very important to be close to everyone in the team as opposed to some views of their employees. While their employees did not necessarily need a very close relationship they state that the company and their employees were like family:
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So I treat it as my second home, so to speak. And my colleagues are my second family. So having social time and having a good social relationship with my team members is very important to me. But I can sense that to every team member is different in that way. Not everyone returns that favour, and I know that it's that this is what it's like, it's just how it works and how interactions are in a business setting or in a business environment. (Leader 1)
The leader further mentioned that they recognized their employees were not always very enthusiastic about spending time on team building activities, which they assumed also was due to the constant online environment:
But I have a feeling, you know, the response wasn't very enthusiastic, and I think the reason for this is that maybe people are still. Maybe there maybe everyone is just drawing that hard line between, OK, this is work time now and this is office time and colleagues are all this time.
(Leader 1)
While all other teams mentioned that some people were just disappearing online, this was not the case in this team. So while the team is still having quite personal relationships with one another, there is still more distance between them than if they would be in the same office together.
Leader initiative vs. employee initiative
While most of the employees mentioned that they would like to occasionally have social online activities to build and maintain their relationship, they were relying on their leader to organize these.
Teleworker 1.1 stated that they missed social moments together “But we also have a, for example, our leader's personal situation, she is like severely busy. So I think it is mostly up to us to just kind of push this through”. On the contrary, Teleworker 1.3 stated that while they personally were excited for social activities such as drinks or online games, they did not take the initiative to organize them: “I also don't take ownership of these things, so I get like it's not happening because it's not for me.”. They further explained that these ideas had been raised multiple times by their leader, but plans never followed through: “But so this was raised and I think my colleague was looking into it and it never
materialized” (Teleworker 1.3).
Also, the leader mentioned that they suggested playing a game but then never followed through with it: “And when it comes to planning stuff online, I even suggested maybe we should start playing online games like among us or something to see if we get to see if we could grow a be closer maybe.” (Leader 1). They further elaborated, however, that they also found it important not to pressure their employees too much:
This also raised expectations. So that's why I'm also very aware of the fact that and why I try to respect their personal time as much as possible, not invade them and try to do more within a
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team setting, because what is important to me is not necessarily privately and of importance to others. (Leader 1)
Generally, they recognized that not all team members expected the same thing from the workplace interactions:
This but aside from the different personalities at this firm, I think we're a very diverse team.
You always have the people who are very much into this kind of thing. And then there are people who are not into this kind of thing at all. And then there are the people who are all, you know, to whom it's all the same in the middle because you think, you know, whatever works out, we can make it work for me. (Leader 1)
Team 2
Support vs demand
The second team was more divided in the support they felt from their leader. On the one hand,
participants described that when they struggled, their leader tried to talk them through it and find ways structure the work processes differently, so that they would find their balance again. An example of this was provided by Teleworker 2.2: “Oh, I think so. So far, so good, because. I didn't have personal problems, but work-related problems, I always message her, I'll call her and then if she's too busy, then she'll call me back.”. On the other hand, participants felt that it was difficult to bring arising problems up to their leader due to their busy schedule. In addition to that, one participant stated that bringing up their concerns and problems were not always valued much or taken seriously, as tasks had to be done the leader's way: “er wordt dan niet aan mij gevraagd van nou, vind je dat wel prettig idee” [No one is asking me whether I find this a good idea] (Teleworker 2.4). Additionally, they added:
Ja, je doet het is rare tijden je wil extra dingen doen voor je werkgever. Maar dan Mag dat ook wel een beetje terugkomen in waardering voor de vrije tijd die je hebt of wilt nemen, want als ik nu een vrije dag wil opnemen, dan moet ik zorgen dat mijn planning wel helemaal passend verloopt. [Yes, in these weird times, you do want to do extra things for your employer. But then they could also show some appreciation in free time that I have or want to take, because now if I try to take a day off it has to fit the planning perfectly] (Teleworker 2.4)
This was also recognized by Teleworker 2.2 who explained: “Sometimes we have to call on my off days because it was sort of emergency situation. And I used to work as well during those days, like Friday and stuff”. In other words, the leader demanded a lot from their employees without replicating the benefit towards the employee. This team, therefore, is more in the middle of the dimension, with some participants leaning towards the feeling supported whereas others feel like the leader is more demanding.
24 Trust vs control
In the second team, neither control nor trust was discussed a lot. Nevertheless, one participant talked about the restrictions of own choices they could make with regard to task division, execution, and choice of work venue. They explained that: “nu wordt er heel veel verdeeld. Al van tevoren. En daardoor is overleg gewoon niet meer mogelijk of tenminste niet zo snel.” [Now, a lot is already being divided beforehand which makes it difficult or simply impossible to negotiate] (Teleworker 2.4). They further mentioned that it was not always easy to deter from the previously laid down structure: “Niet altijd, nee, niet. Dat wordt niet altijd gewaardeerd. Als je dingen door moet schuiven, dan wordt echt inderdaad heel streng in overleg. Ja, of ik moet gewoon inderdaad maar extra extra uren maken.” [Not always, no. That is not always appreciated. If I want to shift things around, it is only possible in very strict negotiation, or I will just have to make some extra hours] (Teleworker 2.4).
The leader of this team explained that due to the distance they had to exert more control and let their employees lay out their tasks more transparent, as it was a lot harder to check peoples progress online: “So we have to be more strict. And everybody everyone has to be transparent as possible online in the tools that we have, about what they are doing, and we have to be very aware of”
(Leader 2). In addition to that, the leader of that team (Leader 9) implied that the employees were trusted to finish their tasks in a timely manner and if they would not be able to, get in touch with the leader.
So the balance and meaning of trust were very different in this team than in others, with both parties (employees and leader) perceiving the same subject very differently.
Proximity vs distance
In the second team, most statements highlighted the distance created by the online environment, which was especially noticeable since only half of the team also worked physically together. They often stated that the team on another location was not as involved and that they weren’t as familiar with them, as they have only ever met them physically once. Participants noticed that the communication with the team at the other location was inherently more formal: “To them, I only speak work, work- related, sometimes a little bit, but mostly work-related. So I think that's really different than the colleagues I work with here because I hear about their private life more” (Teleworker 2.1).
Furthermore, participants were wary about building and maintaining a relationship with others in a completely online environment with one participant clearly stating “Well, no, I don't think you get the same relationship if you talk all the time online” (Teleworker 2.1). One of the points that was brought up was that having contact merely via online means did not work well for creating a bond between the different team members (Leader 2). The leader mentioned that while they tried to set up informal activities such as online lunches, it was hard to create a personal bond:
